Post#1158 » by Bernman » Thu Mar 2, 2017 1:38 am
TDD and the ability to punch him off to regain space. Boxing, footwork, and tdd are the best ways to resist a bjj master. Gamebred has at least 2 of those 3 aspects in his arsenal. The footwork one is iffy, but we saw better overal movement against Cerrone, and that's one reason he pulled the moderate upset there. He did look improved too. So we shouldn't be so flippant about a belief that Maia will win. I'll take Maia because if it does go to the ground, and he gets control before Gamebred can get his back up off the mat, then it's going to be tough for Jorge to recover. He's said before, "I don't do that pajama stuff". But he has the tools to not end up in those positions much if at all, and if he can hurt Cerrone with power punches to the head, that's something he can do against Maia. That's something else he displayed improvement in, during the Cerrone fight, was sitting down on his punches and throwing them with more fluidity. So I don't think Maia should be more than -200. It's an interesting enough match-up. One may conversely be worried that it's not easy enough, while not being a big money fight either, for a guy who should already have a title shot. He could get knocked off his #1 contender spot.